Acceptance
by Ephemerale
Summary: She no longer knows her daughter, cannot reconcile the strange woman with haunted eyes and a crude, brute of a lover with the bubbly, bright eyed child that left years before. But there are simply some things a mother must learn to accept.  Rayne


She no longer knew her daughter. Regan watched River float through the room, running her fingers over smooth mahogany and cut crystal as though she had never seen the objects before. She had shunned the dress that Regan had tried to give her- a pretty yellow thing that she would have loved as a child of fourteen, but now scorned for worn leather pants, clunky combat boots, and a faded camisole. She had a gun strapped to one hip, a knife on her calf… she looked nothing like an aristocrat of Osiris, and everything like a pirate.

Gone was the shy, bubbly girl of yesteryear, the pretty little thing with a sweet smile and pale cheeks that easily bloomed with color, her beauty and innocence doing little to mask the liveliness and intelligence in her eyes. In her place was a graceful, twitchy girl with tangled hair and haunted eyes, with all the behaviors one would associate with a fugitive. She had difficulty making eye contact, would duck her chin and sway a little on her feet as she talked. She spoke in halting sentences, confusing riddles intermixed with her normal speech, and she often referred to herself in the third person.

For the first time, Regan found herself believing all the things that Simon had said about the Academy. Simon's eyes were cold when he looked at her now, and she keenly felt the lost of her firstborn's love and trust. It was a pain like she had never experienced before, as though her heart had been ripped out of her chest and stormed away of its own volition, and yet she managed to keep on breathing. But that was nothing in comparison to the overwhelming, all consuming guilt.

River had wanted to go to the academy, had begged for it. Regan had been hesitant, not wanting to send her only daughter and youngest child away from home, wanting to keep her close, to cherish her, to love her. But she also wanted what was best for her little genius, the girl who had corrected her brother's spelling when she was three, who had mastered Simon's medical textbooks within a week of him starting his classes. And so she had allowed her daughter to go, sending her off with a kiss and a smile, praying that she would return home soon.

She hadn't seen the signs, or perhaps she just hadn't wanted to. Simon had seen them, had tried to garner her support, but she didn't want to believe that her child was being hurt, that the alliance her husband wholeheartedly supported could be capable of anything as dastardly as the things Simon had hinted at. And because she was foolish, because she was blind she had lived in her own little world, allowing her daughter to be abused. Her son did what she did not: spent his fortune, threw away his place in society to rescue his sister. She wished to God that she would have believed him, that she would have helped him. Because she had not, Simon had taken her place as her daughter's parent, and her children no longer had any use for her.

Simon had refused to spend any time with her, shaking his head in disgust and walking back to the ship he was squandering his skills on hand in hand with a young, kind but classless mechanic. Kaylee was not the woman she would have chosen for her son, but she had sensed something sweet in the girl, somehow knew that the brown eyed, grease covered young woman would be good for Simon. Would be mother as well as lover.

River had looked into her eyes, touched her cheek, and had whispered, "You didn't do it on purpose," causing Regan's eyes to fill with tears. She had then agreed to return to her childhood home for the day, but on the condition that the massive, hulking mercenary named Cobb was allowed to accompany her. Regan had readily agreed, desperate to make up for lost time, eager to hold and play with and love her little girl once more. But her little girl, the bright eyed, clever child that she had raised, was gone. The little wraith floating through her living room was a different person entirely, someone harder, someone damaged.

Her heart aching, she shifted her attention to the massive mercenary sitting on her sofa, looking almost comical in his obvious discomfiture at his lush surroundings. She caught him eying her rings, and realized that one item of her jewelry must be worth more money than he would see in a year. For a moment she felt fear, fear that the massive man would rip them from her fingers and run, and she was startled from her thoughts by her daughter's voice.

"He will not. He was merely wishing that his mother could glitter as you do," the girl said, not even glancing in Regan's direction, her attention fixated by a crystal peacock on the mantle of the fireplace. Regan started, her hand flying to her throat, wondering if she had been foolish enough to speak the words out loud. She must have. How else could her child have read her thoughts? She risked a glance at the big mercenary who, surprisingly, was flushed and scowling at her little slip of a daughter.

"Just 'cause you can read my thoughts don't mean you're allowed to repeat them," he grumbled, looking even more uncomfortable now than he did before.

_Read his thoughts…_ Regan swallowed hard, feeling entirely out of her element. Simon had said that they'd done things to her child, turned her into a weapon. Had the scientists managed to induce telepathy?

Her child met her gaze, the dark eyes bright with intelligence, and nodded once before sliding over to the big man, gently running her fingers through his dark hair and leaning down to press her cheek against his. "Apologies," she murmured, and the mercenary sighed before lightly patting her hand as though in acceptance.

_Oh._ Regan swallowed hard, watching her little girl press a kiss to the cheek of a man at least two decades her senior, who had likely spent a vast majority of his time and money on fancy women and spirits. She repressed the desire to order her child away from the scarred, intimidating man with a gun longer than her forearm, reminding herself that she no longer had the right.

River met her gaze again, appearing as though she knew what Regan had been thinking, and the woman swallowed, discomfited. River glided away again, over to Gabriel's chair. She watched as the big mercenary's eyes followed the girl's every movement as though he was a planet and her daughter was his sun. Her lips quirked a little at the realization, suddenly coming to the conclusion that the large man was in love with her child. She wasn't entirely sure how she felt about it, but she was relieved that the evidence pointed to the fact that the man treated her child well.

"Father's chair," River murmured softly, and Regan's attention was once again riveted on her child. The girl ran her fingertips over the thick brocade of the cushion, her fingers startlingly long and pale. "He observed the girl and the boy be attacked by independent forces from this tower," she murmured softly, and Regan's heart constricted at the convoluted words and the memories they represented.

All at once, a six year old river dressed in her lacy white nighty rose up in her mind's eye, the clever little child and her brother pretending that they were holding the independent forces at bay. Once, River had been forced to resort to cannibalism when they were held under siege and the supplies had run out. Always bright, always saying the strangest things… Regan grieved the loss of that little girl.

The grown up, haunted version of that child drifted away again, her attention caught by a painting hanging from the far wall. She was memorizing everything, Regan knew. This would be the last time her daughter would stand in this room. The words had not been said, of course, but it was what Regan's intuition was telling her. Her daughter, no longer a test subject, no longer a fugitive, had waltzed into her life and would dance right back out of it again. There was no longer a place for her in her daughter's world; River had created a new family for herself, a ship as her mother, a mercenary as her lover, a Companion as her sister.

Regan let out a deep sigh and glanced back towards the mercenary, who met her gaze with a surprising amount of intelligence in his blue eyes. The man was a gun toting brute who obviously lacked a half-way decent education, slurped his tea, chewed with his mouth open, cursed in a manner that made her blush, and had the thickest rim accent that she had ever heard. He was not what he would have chosen for her little girl. River deserved someone who could spoil her, pamper her, give her a comfortable life. But somehow, she sensed that a comfortable life was not what her daughter needed.

River looked out of place in the finery of this room, and her hand occasionally strayed to the gun at her hip as though to ease her mind. The woman her daughter had grown into enjoyed combat, thrived on excitement- a life on a core planet geared around fancy parties and child rearing would be too dull for her. She loved the life she led, and while Regan could not understand it, she was unable to begrudge her daughter her happiness. And the mercenary her daughter had chosen apparently made her happy.

"Mister Cobb," Regan began, and the man shook his head.

"I ain't no gentleman. Call me Cobb or Jayne; leave the mister out of it," he replied, and Regan took in a deep breath but nodded.

"Jayne," she corrected herself, and the big man nodded. She glanced over to where her daughter was still fully absorbed in the painting, her slim fingers brushing against the oils on the canvas. "I failed her as a mother, I know. Please… protect her, love her the way I should have," she said softly, and she could see the surprise that fell across the mercenary's features. And shockingly, the sympathy.

"You ain't what I was expectin' her mama to be like," he said softly, glancing over her, sizing her up and apparently finding something in her that made his hard eyes go soft and his rigid posture relax a little. "Hell, I know I ain't what you were expecting her man to be like," he added, and Regan found herself smiling a little. "She don't need no protecting; she's a strong woman, and she could feed me my toes if she ever got it into her head that she wanted to. But you got my word, I'll look out for her anyways. I'll be there for her whenever she needs me," he replied, sincerity ringing in his voice and shining in his blue eyes.

Regan's smile widened, and she looked over the man with new eyes. He was uncouth, uneducated, crass and crude… but there was a kindness and a depth to him that shocked her, and damaged as River was, he didn't seem to care. He loved her anyway, and suddenly Regan was certain that he would give his life for her child if need be.

She loved her daughter, would miss River intensely once the girl left her childhood home for good. But there was some comfort to be found in the fact that she had a parent's love in Simon, and the fierce devotion of a deceptively simple mercenary. She would yearn for the daughter she had lost, for the one that she did not understand, but at least that yearning would no longer be tinged by fear.

River had found a home, she had found love. And really, that was all a mother could hope for.


End file.
